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"This second allocation is absolutely critical but as you know even this won't meet all the city's unmet needs," said Mayor Michael Bloomberg, shown here with Rep. Jerrold Nadler and Sen. Charles Schumer at New York University.
(Staten Island Advance/Jillian Jorgensen)

NEW YORK -- Nearly a year to the day Hurricane Sandy buffeted Staten
Island's shores, $1.3 billion more in relief funding is on the way from the federal
government, city and federal officials announced Monday.

"The bottom line is very simple -- we have adequate funding,
it is flexible, and it will do the job," Sen. Charles Schumer said at a press
conference held at New York University in Manhattan.

"We didn't want to make the same mistakes that were made in Katrina,
where funds were spent where they shouldn't have, and funds that should have
been spent weren't," Schumer said. "This second year will be a whole lot better.
The spigot is now open -- the aid spigot is now open. Money will be flowing,
particularly to homeowners and small businesses."

Schumer, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Housing and Urban Development
Secretary Shaun Donovan, and U.S. Reps. Nydia Velazquez and Jerrold Nadler were all
on hand for the announcement of the additional money, also to be delivered as
Community Development Block Grants (CDBG).

The grants have been the source of funding for the NYC Build
it Back program -- and some of the $1.3 billion will go toward it, Deputy Mayor
Cas Holloway said. That will be good news for homeowners registered for the
program -- just last week, Holloway said the first allocation hadn't provided
enough funding to cover all of them.

Holloway said it hadn't been determined how much of the
new $1.34 billion would go to Build it Back. "But there's no question this is
going to help us cover a lot more in the program," he said.

Still, the money won't cover everyone, he said, but that's
why the city is working with Donovan to get the third allocation out as fast as
possible.

"I think we're going to be able to cover a lot, the vast
majority of needs," Holloway said.

The officials hailed CDBG funding as being flexible enough
to help homeowners, businesses, and the city itself recover from the storm. In
addition to the $1.3 billion coming to the city, another $2.1 billion will be
allocated to New York State in what is the second "tranche" of block grant
funding.

"Increasingly, this aid will also go to infrastructure and
other critical projects that will better protect the city from storms in the
future," Donovan said.

All of the funding is part of the $60 billion aid package
Congress passed -- after months of delays -- earlier this year. Of that $60
billion package, $16 billion was tagged as CDBG funds, some of which is still
forthcoming in future tranches of money. That $16 billion is the money most
likely to directly affect storm victims. The rest of the aid package is mostly
reimbursements to municipalities for the cost of the storm and the clean-up.

"This second allocation is absolutely critical, but as you
know, even this won't meet all of the city's needs," Bloomberg said to Donovan.
"And that's why we're glad you've agreed to work with us and make sure that as much
federal Sandy relief aid as possible is allocated to the city's unmet needs
before the end of the year."

The city will have to submit another "Action Plan" to the
federal government outlining how it will spend the second tranche of money. The
block grants are technically to be used for recovering from any disaster over a
three-year period, ending this year. While the vast majority of the money will
go to Sandy, Donovan warned that if another disaster happens, it will have to
fund that, too.

"We still have billions of dollar left to allocate," Donovan
said. "We cannot make final allocations until we know what happens in the rest
of the year."

Bloomberg said the city would make its requests for funding
before the end of his term.